Some thoughts on Canadian politics

Topics: Politics, Thoughts | December 21, 2008 @ 3:36 PM

There’s been a fair bit going on in Canadian politics of late.  The biggest thing would probably be the parliamentary dispute.  I’ve heard a number of things said about the idea of a Liberal-NDP coalition:

I must say that I find these views to be at worst tremendously uninformed and at best annoyingly sanctimonious.  First of all, the coalition is not undemocratic, nor are the procedures that would remove the conservatives from government.  What is “undemocratic” supposed to mean here, anyway?  The only time any regular Canadian voter voted in federal matters was to elect their MP.  I don’t see any MPs getting removed from office despite the fact that they got the “popular” vote.  Anyone who says that we voted for Stephen Harper should be barred from ever voting again.  Furthermore, saying that nobody voted for the coalition might be true, but in various (better) democracies around the world, coalitions are formed all the time (both pre- and post-election).  The MPs stances on issues hasn’t changed, and so the votes for them are still valid.

As for the coalition’s being immoral, I’ve heard someone say that a coalition-supporter ought to admit that he or she would rather cater to the views of separatists than to conservatives.  This seems sound at first, but I think this point is flawed because it implies that in the two cases, the two parties (the Bloc and the Conservatives) would have equal influence, which is absolutely not the case.  With the Conservatives in power, they would form the government; the Bloc has pledged support on confidence issues and so cannot hold that over the coalition’s head.  They could become key deciders on certain issues, which might be perceived as a little dangerous, but seeing as they will be affected by the decisions and they are more in line with the coalition’s thoughts, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem.  Regardless, there’s no way they’ll be able to withhold confidence support from the coalition because they want to separate.  The only way that they could get separation is through a 60% (or was it two thirds?) majority referendum or else the support of the Conservatives, which they’ll either give out of a spite (unlikely) or because they really do want to screw Canada over (I’m assuming that they don’t want to screw Canada over even though they act like it all the time).  Given the Conservatives economic “plan,” I’d much rather give my support to working with – not giving way to – the Bloc than giving the Conservatives any opportunity to destroy us further.

“Dirty grab for power” is a little bit harder to discuss.  A lot of things could be called “dirty,” such as Harper’s appointment of vacant Senate seats so that any incoming coalition couldn’t appoint it themselves.  I think that this label doesn’t apply because the coalition is being formed out of vehement disgust at the Conservatives’ views and a concern for Canada’s future, so I don’t think the “dirty” label applies.

Of course, none of this would even be an issue if we had proportional representation; the first-past-the-post system is one of Canadian democracy’s biggest faults.  While I’m on a roll, I’ll also point out the uselessness of the Senate (I don’t think I’d agree with abolition but instead with massive Triple-E reform), the possibility of an American-style left party vs. right party system implied by first-past-the-post, and that people should be required to pass a test before being allowed to vote (to indicate that they can make a lucid and informed decision).

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One Response to “Some thoughts on Canadian politics”

  1. Ian Says:
    December 21st, 2008 @ 5:26 PM

    Prop Rep would almost undoubtedly ensure that we had more coalitions. What would be good is once people understand that politicians of different stripes are supposed to work together in minority governments.

    Here’s my favourite: “they didn’t run on a coalition” which is equivalent to “Harper didn’t run on a platform of being a douche.” Some things just happen.

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